


Empirical Affiliation Praxis

by Sheffield



Category: Vorkosigan Saga - Lois McMaster Bujold
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-12-27
Updated: 2012-12-27
Packaged: 2017-11-22 15:54:28
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 15
Words: 4,475
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/611564
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sheffield/pseuds/Sheffield
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>This year, I wrote a snippet for the Fandom Stocking of anyone who posted before December 11th that they would like to receive Vorkosigan saga snippets.  They don't connect or follow, and I haven't listed the crossover characters that appear here and there as none of them has a particularly significant role.  Well, except Jack, but that's just Jack...  The only snippet I think requires a warning is the third, which requires knowledge of the end of Cryoburn and is as a result rather sombre.  Snippet two is post-CVA but I don't believe it contains any kind of spoilers; Ivan comes back - you don't need to know from where. Oh, and the final one has Evil!Alys, which may make your brain hurt a bit.</p><p>I've titled the whole collection after snippet 11, just because it's my favourite title ever.  (Look it up.  Seriously.)</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. The Cat in the Hat

“Well,” said Jack leaning back against the headboard and opening his arms wide, “that was a lot of fun, kids.”  
Cordelia Naismith Vorkosigan, co-regent of the planet Sergyar, Betan in origin and thoroughly Betan in, er, sexual habits and customs, said nothing but smiled sweetly and snuggled contentedly under Jack’s arm.  
On the other side of their visitor, Aral was looking as croggled as a Barayaran man faced with a time-travelling sexual omnivore and an understanding and enthusiastically participant wife could reasonably expect to look.  
The Regents’ Bed was a good size although it was of course designed for, well, a proper Barrayaran marriage bed. You know, one with TWO people in it. Not three. Not when one of them was a smug intergalactic time travelling sexual omnivore wearing nothing but an enormous grin and a rather fetching but inexplicable bucket-shaped hat. With a tassle.  
Aral collected his manners and his wits and managed a coherent “um”.  
“Quite,” added Cordelia. “Only one of our armsmen and a chambermaid will be here in about five minutes with our breakfast. And I really don’t think Barrayar is ready for you yet, lovie.”  
“Barrayar?” Jack said nervously. “I thought this planet was called Sergyar?”  
“Oh no - Sergyar is where we’re stationed at the moment. Just now we’re on home leave for our son’s wedding…”  
“Your son is called…?”  
“Miles is the elder. The one getting married is Mark.”  
“Mark… Vorkosigan… of Barrayar???”  
But Jack Harkness was suited, booted and strapping on his vortex manipulator before either of them could muster the wit to say “yes”.

The fez lay on the night stand, but the traveller was gone.

“You know, love,” Cordelia said carefully, “I’m sure there’s an interesting story there somewhere.”  
“Promise me,” Aral said hoarsely, “that it’s one you’ll never tell me, even if you ever find out.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> For Kaffyr, who asked for Jack and anyone he cares for, which somehow prompted me to have him steal the wrong doctor’s hat.


	2. Back to the fuschia

“The Emperor will see you now,” the armsman said. Ivan checked his lapels for unauthorised crumbs, his shoes for unauthorised smuts and his face for unauthorised smirking and then followed.  
“I didn’t do it, nobody saw me, there’s no way you can prove it,” he said automatically, winning a rare grin from Gregor.  
“Unfortunately it’s not something anyone has done,” the emperor said, “but more a case of, well, an identity crisis.”  
Ivan was a twenty year man, time served, and his hot pink jacket, Escobarran in cut and teamed with a fetching pair of black trousers skimming his shiny shiny *pink* shoes might as well have been a neon sign screaming CIVILIAN!!!! AND NOT AT ALL INTERESTED IN POLITICS, THANK YOU. He was really fond of that outfit, although he hadn’t previously had the chance to try it out on Gregor since his return three days ago.  
“I’m not having an identity crisis,” he said indignantly. Gregor’s eyes flicked briefly over his outfit and he did that not-quite-smiling thing that was the Imperial equivalent of “rolls on the floor laughing”.  
“Look, Ivan, I wasn’t referring to you and your new, er, career plans at all, in fact. I was simply coming around to the fact that We - and that’s “We” with a capital letter - have something of a problem. And I wondered whether you might help out.”  
“What’s Miles done this time?”  
“Not Miles. Not even Mark. And in any case neither of them is on-planet at present, as you well know. Professor Vorthys is on Komarr and I genuinely don’t think either Impsec nor my other auditors are quite up to… well.”  
“Now wait a minute, Gregor: I’ve barely unpacked yet and I’m enjoying my first few days of unemployment just fine thank you very much…”  
“Ivan. Shut up.”  
“Shutting up, Sire.”  
“Cousin, do me a favour? I have two very peculiar people in the next room. They appeared in the garden four hours ago. Literally stepped out of nowhere. Through what Laisa reliably informs me was a shiny hole in space. Impsec are running around inventing Cetagandan portable wormhole weaponry but I’m inclined to take them at face value. They simply - had some bad luck. With some… novel device, as the Professor would say. An unrepeatable accident that looks likely to be permanent, in which case I have NO idea what we’re going to do with them. So please, as a favour to me, will you please go next door and make nice with them till I can come up with a better idea?”  
“Sireyessire” Ivan smirked. But he’d do it, of course he would. That peculiar nexus of personal and familial and civil responsibility would let him do no less.  
Gregor opened the door and Ivan saw… a giant. A half-naked giant in leather trousers, and a shrimp of a man next to him in a pink waistcoat several sizes too small.  
“Ivan Vorpatril, may I make you known to the hero and demigod Hercules and his friend and partner Iolaus.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> For Lannamichael, whose prompts included Vorkosigan and Hercules, the Legendary Journeys. And I was trying to write a crossover, really I was, but somehow the image of Ivan in a kind of military version of those Miami Vice pink jackets wrestled my writing hand into submission…


	3. Mourning has broken

Gorge wanted out, but Miles had the appetite of a sparrow. Mark told Gorge to back off, ordered enough food for two and split it three ways between himself, Miles and Roic.  
“Sit with us, Armsman,” he said. Roic looked lost, but his eyes flicked to Miles before he answered, “I… Yes, Milord.”  
So they sat, the three of them, round the tiny table in the tiny cabin and had tiny bites of the tiny trays of food.  
Except for Miles, who still looked as if he’d been stuffed. Or gutted, perhaps? Skin and bone, a skeleton on a stick. “Eat,” Mark said flatly. When nothing happened Roic gently guided his Lord’s hand towards a fork. “Milady gave me strict orders,” he said gently.  
“Ekaterin!” Miles said suddenly, “I have to call-”  
“It’s all right,” Mark reminded him, “she already knows. There’s nothing you need to do just now except eat.”  
Too late. The strings were cut, no-one was home again. Damn, that was the most Miles had said in, what, three days now.  
Roic made a gentle throat-clearing noise.  
“Roic?”  
“Milord probably needs to check his seizure stimulator, yes?”  
Miles said nothing, skeleton on a stick. “Go get it,” Mark decided. He let Gorge have thirty seconds while Roic was out of the room, but managed to wrestle him back down when the Armsman returned.  
“I, er…”  
“Oh. Yes. Carry on, Roic.”  
Fascinating as it would be to see the famous seizure stimulator Mark understood why Miles always hid himself away for the procedure. He waited anxiously outside the cabin, an impromptu guard of honour.  
Roic emerged after perhaps ten minutes.  
Miles was grey but there was, finally, someone there behind the eyes again.  
“He… died, Mark.”  
“I know,” he said. And, finally, three days and five wormhole jumps later, the brothers wept.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> For Sholio, whose request for Mark and Miles sent me in a rather depressing direction, sorry.


	4. Yes, Gregor, there IS a Father Frost

Aral came into the library with a face like thunder and had time for a quick “parenthood, incoming!” before he was followed by two armsmen carrying - very, very carefully and with the greatest reluctance - a screaming, thrashing Emperor.  
“Um… thank you Trevor, Georg: I think the Emperor needs a moment or two’s consultation with his Regent on matters of state. You’d better leave us.”  
They stepped back, carefully, because Gregor was still at the thrashing stage and they had very good, very carefully trained inhibitions about leaving him anywhere where he might be harmed. By anything, including himself. Cordelia valued the thought, but deprecated the exceptionalism behind it. All children were valuable, Miles, Eleanor and Ivan for example, no less than poor Gregor.  
Now, what had set him off? Gregor was normally a preternaturally biddable child but this was a genuine tantrum with shrieks, sobs and real tears.  
Sighing, she hurled her iced tea over the little Emperor and the world froze. She was dimly aware of Aral reaching for a weapon, the spinal reflex of the Barrayaran man faced with the unexpected. Gregor, however, had stopped howling long enough to look astonished and, into the deep breath of that silent astonishment, Cordelia said quietly “Gregor?”  
“Tante Cordelia!”  
And there it was, an armful of sobbing six-year-old rather than a public meeting of misbehaving Empire.  
“Tante Cordelia, say it isn’t so!”  
“Say what isn’t so?”  
“Fa-huh, fah-uh, Father Froooooost!!!!”  
Uh-ho. She’d already warned Aral that teaching children they were due gifts from a supernatural housebreaker was a hard sell.  
“What about Father Frost?”  
“Piotr said…” She looked over Gregor’s head to see if Aral would offer her a clue who Piotr might be. Not her father in law, clearly, who could barely speak in the Emperor’s presence.  
“Vorsoisson cousin, on Alys’s list,” Aral cued. Ah. Yes, of course; the Winterfair Party, at which Gregor was to be gently introduced to some of his future peer group/liege people, with positive reinforcement provided in the form of ice skating, hot chocolate and, if she remembered correctly, a display of table top fireworks from the Imperial Corps of Engineers for which read “pyromaniacs”, she thought fondly.  
“What did Piotr say, Gregor?”  
“He said there WAS no Father Frost!” fatherless, motherless Gregor wailed. Ah yes. That one.  
“Well of course, if you mean an actual fat man in a green jacket who comes down the chimney and brings you toys, of course not. But you knew that, Gregor: we spent yesterday afternoon wrapping up presents for Father Frost to give to Baby Ivan and Baby Miles and Baby Eleanor, and to Piotr and the others at your party. You knew that.”  
Gregor had enjoyed the gift wrapping, it seemed; at least the memory of it left him hiccuping gently rather than sobbing outright.  
“Father Frost is in our hearts, not in our chimneys,” she said gently. “So you are Father Frost for Baby Miles and I am Father Frost for you, and Aral is Father Frost for me - everyone can be Father Frost for anyone they like. And that is real, I promise you.”  
“Promise?  
“Promise.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> For Florastuart, for the prompt Aral/Cordelia, Cordelia being awesome!


	5. Silent Night

Alys lay back against Simon’s shoulder and took another sip of her wine. The stars were so bright she almost felt she could reach out and pluck one from the velvet ground of the sky. Simon was a drowsy warmth behind her, the black and silver night warm and fragrant like a blanket, the gentle sussuration of the waves a quiet lulling to sleep.  
“To me,” Simon said quietly, “Winterfair has always been about work. Work and snow. Or rain. When I was stationed at Kaloniika we had three inches of rain in three days and fifteen of the enlisted men got trench foot. This…” He waved his glass of wine expansively to take in the tropical beach, their holiday cabin, the quiet starlit sky. “This… is much better.”  
“To me,” Alys said, “Winterfair has always been about display. Being on display, preparing a display, making sure everything is conducted in Good Form.” She sipped her wine, her hair hanging loose to her waist, her robe belted loose over her Komarran-style trousers. “This… is much better.”  
They lay there in the tropical darkness, holding hands. And nothing - nothing - happened.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> For Trobadora


	6. A Future Offworld Colony

“I think you may be in the wrong place,” she said calmly. Because even if two men in rather strange clothing had literally popped into existence six feet away from her, well, they were nevertheless in the gardens of the Viceregal Palace of Sergyar and there were enough armsmen, security systems and Big Men With Guns within earshot that…  
Well, Cordelia Naismith Vorkosigan wouldn’t actually have been afraid of these two even if she’d been alone on an unexplored planet.  
The one with the green fuzzy top (was that a sweater? Made from actual animal fibre? How very… disturbing) had something in his hand that might be a stunner but not a brand that Cordelia had ever seen. Not a nerve disruptor… oh goodness, was it an actual *projectile weapon*?   
The other one - tall as Aral, slender as Miles, eyes like Mark’s - said calmly “I think you should put the gun down, John. Really slowly, and preferably without its coming to bear on any of these people. Particularly this lady.”  
“Cordelia Naismith Vorkosigan” she said.  
“Madame Vorkosigan.”  
The other one - John? - carefully put his antique weapon on the ground and raised his hands in the universal “peace, I give up” gesture.   
“Madame?” he said curiously.  
“Obviously, John. Look. The lady is clearly married - the state of her fingernails and the cut of her bolero would tell you that. The different uniforms worn by her protectors tell you she lives a protected life in a militarised, hierarchical society - probably based on Russian patterns, although there could be some French and, what, Greek? in there too. The gentlemen in brown and silver are wearing the livery of her particular clan - as you can tell by the pattern of tiles on the patio floor and the scarf over the back of her chair. Whereas the gentlemen in black are some overarching organisation - see the silver pins on their collars, horus eyes, suggesting surveillance, suggesting supervision as well as protection. And of course the fact that we stumbled into Professor Challenger’s device just at the point of activation means we could be anywhere, any time, but I venture to suggest we are no longer on earth, partly because of the presence of at least three artificial satellites in the sky and the rather bizarre flying jellyfish approaching over the courtyard gate-“  
There was a brief pause while the ImpSec man closest fried the poor beastie with his plasma arc.  
“And of course the weaponry. We appear to have been translocated to a future off world colony.”  
Cordelia found she was holding her breath and so when she and the man in the fuzzy jumper spoke it was simultaneous.  
“Brilliant!” they said.  
And then, again simultaneously if rather less cheerfully, “and now what?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> For Ravenskyewalker: a Vorkosigan/Sherlock crossover


	7. Miles Poker

“Food!” Taura said, pushing her pile of chocolate coins into the middle of the gaming table.  
“Ok…” Cordelia said slowly, “I feel like I’m cheating though. When he was very small he used to invent characters for his food. All the peas, especially, were little soldiers in undress greens, and he used to march them up a hill of mashed potato instead of eating them.”  
Ekaterin smiled and said quietly “At first you don’t notice. Ma Kosti’s food will do that - for a long time, actually. But take him somewhere else, outside of Ma Kosti’s orbit, and you’ll see it. It’s not what you put on the table that makes the difference, it’s who you are. I’ve never seen him refuse food from the people in the Dendarii hills, for example - even Maple Mead. But he can be in the Residence for days without it occurring to him to sample any of the snacks. There. I think that counts?”  
Professora Vorthys said quietly “I think I’ll have to fold. I’m not sure I’ve ever seen him eat - apart from one particularly memorable dinner party of course… Why, yes, I withdraw my fold, and I cite the Bug Butter Dinner Party.”  
They looked expectantly at Sargent Taura.  
“Oh, I have a winner here,” she said. In the game of Miles Poker, the Rat Bar and the Raw Rat had to beat all comers.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> For Cosmic_Lin, who asked for Ekaterin, Taura, Cordelia and Professora Vorthys.


	8. Elastic recoil

“Oh my goodness, Father Frost is real!”  
Because the Emperor of Barrayar was, what, ten years old - and he, Miles Naismith Vorkosigan, was, perhaps - five?  
He bounced on the bed excitedly. “Gregor! Gregor! Father Frost is real! We’re kids again!”  
And then he stopped bouncing and started giggling helplessly. Because in the other room there was still a table laid out for the Imperial tea party. And he and the Emperor had a long-overdue appointment with a big, big plate of… cream pies!

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> For Bessemerprocess: Miles/Gregor, character kiddification


	9. Dork

“Her name,” Ivan said suavely, “is Helena Vorkatrys, and she’s from the South Continent. Ma’mere had her shipped here last week to meet you, and you’re supposed to ask her to dance at least three dances.”  
“Yes, I know, thank you,” Gregor said repressively, “but, I mean, look at her. Does she have to be so… so…”  
“Tall?” Miles suggested.   
“Willowy?” Ivan added.  
“Zaftig?”  
“Thank you, Miles. Exactly the encouragement I needed.”  
Gregor looked genuinely unhappy and Miles suddenly had That Look on his face.  
“No.” Ivan said immediately. “Whatever you’re thinking, no.”  
“But Ivan,” Miles said, “we’re loyal servants of the Imperium. Here to obey the Emperor’s every whim. Even the ones he hasn’t thought of yet.”  
“You mean, it’s our loyal duty to squire Miss Vorkatrys around the party and help steer her away from the Emperor?” Ivan was starting to look interested after all.  
“Miles…” Gregor said warningly.  
But he didn’t say no.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> For Frith_in_thorns, for the prompt Miles and Ivan and Gregor being dorks.


	10. The Nightmare Before Christmas

“No, Tante Alys. You are a married woman, remember? My place is next to Gregor now, you must go down.”  
Down? Down in rank, down in place, down the long, long banqueting table full of all those Vorladies who had had their eyes on her all these years, waiting, waiting…  
Down the table, away from Gregor and Aral and Miles and Ivan, away from the centre of influence, of power, of her own status as undisputed leader of Vor society…  
Down to the very end of the table; down to the end where the proles and the plebes sat… “Madame Illyan” (“Ma Illyan” they were sniggering now, not even a courtesy “Madame”)  
The table was longer, surely? Longer and longer and longer… reaching out beyond Vorbar Sultana, beyond Barrayar altogether, beyond Komarr, beyond Sergyar… take a wormhole jump to hell, Ma Illyan!

She sat up, gasping.  
It was four in the morning. All was well, except for the pounding of her heart.  
“What is it?” Simon said, rolling to his feet.  
“Nothing, love,” she said, deliberately calming her voice. “A nightmare. Go back to sleep. Just a touch of indegestion, I think - you know the old saying? More “gravy than the grave” “  
Simon smiled, checked the room like a prowling cat and then came back to bed and snuggled back down. She took a deep, cleansing breath - all those years of Monday morning classes with Drou had to be good for something, after all - and lay down beside him. He tucked her comfortably under his arm and she relaxed. Ma Illyan’s life wouldn’t be such a bad old life after all.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> For Philomytha, an Illyan and Alys nightmare before Christmas. 
> 
> Notes: The “you must go down” is stolen from Pride and Prejudice and “more gravy than the grave” from Dickens’ Christmas Carol.


	11. Empirical Affiliation Praxis

“Um… all right.”  
She let them put on the headset and then sat back, trying to relax.  
“Now, Ms Vorkosigan, if you’d just listen to the music for a moment and relax, we’ll make a start on the diagnostics…”  
The music was faintly familiar, a jaunty little tune she could swear she’d heard somewhere… somewhere recently… somewhere… nice…

***

Outside in the waiting area Miles had the same look of crogglement she imagined she had on her own face. One thing for Betans, they never left you in any… doubt. Any. Doubt. At. All.  
But then he broke into the same random smile she recognised from the other side of her own face, the smile of a small child given Everything They Could Ever Want by Father Frost, with maple sugar on top. My, she thought mildly, if only she’d known what a trip to the Orb entailed, she would have insisted they came here first…

***

Several pleasant, sweaty and rather unexpected hours later (it turned out that “empirical affiliation praxis via a team of qualified LPSTs” didn’t mean AT ALL what she had imagined!) she remembered to look up the tune they’d been playing in the diagnostic waiting room. Maybe she could uplink a copy…  
Ah.  
The Betan Good Sex Song.  
Perhaps not.  
Her finger hovered over the uplink button but then she thought, well, what the heck…

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> For Fallingtowers, who asked for ‘ship and somehow thus prompted my favourite title *ever* to pop into my brain unbidden.


	12. Star Crash

One moment they were on the veranda watching the stars on the velvet black Barrayaran night, and the next Simon was trying to push her inside and reach for his com link, which of course she’d made him leave behind because, honeymoon? NO WORK OF ANY KIND, that was the understanding. And now some fool in a burning lightflyer was trying to land on the beach right in front of them and…  
“That isn’t a lightflyer, Simon - it’s too big…”  
They had an ImpSec screamer button, of course they did, they were Them, after all, and Alys had already set it off.  
But the burning vessel that wasn’t a lightflyer was really burning - that was the kind of damage you get from a plasma arc in space and then a hard, hard landing in atmosphere and had he been trying for the ocean?  
It ploughed an enormous furrow in the soft white sand and came to rest, almost silently, right on the edge of ocean, the shattered cockpit barely lapped by the waves.  
But they were already running, barefoot on the sand, because this was no set-up, no security theatre, this was real, a real crashed spacecraft of a kind neither of them had ever seen before and there was a chance, just a chance, that the pilot had survived the landing.  
“Here!” she yelled, because she’d gone left, he right, but she’d found a way inside and there was a man and she couldn’t LIFT him, damn it, but she could drag him and he was resisting her, and then Simon was there and they were hauling him out of the crashed vehicle but he was fighting them.  
“What did he say?”  
“Inside!” Alys said, “there’s another one.”  
They left him on the sand and went back. Who knew what fuel it used but if it was going to blow it was going to be big and where were ImpSec? Alys reached into the wreckage and found a fur coat.  
“Here!” she said and Simon came and they took the person under the arms and dragged her - him, surely, that tall? - back and out and it wasn’t a woman or a man in a fur coat, or at least the fur was part of the person because where it was singed there was blood and it was a giant… bear?”  
“Chewie!” their man on the beach was moaning, and the giant… bear? moaned back, wordless.  
“Well,” Alys said, hands on hips, looking crossly at the lights of the approaching lightflyers, “I suppose we ought to be glad they’re here at all. But I can’t help feeling that first contact with non-human species is more Impsec’s job than ours. At least not on our honeymoon!”  
Then she turned, all smiles, to the wounded man and his companion.  
“Welcome to Barrayar,” she said mildly. “I’m Alys… Illyan”  
“Han Solo. Chewbacca.”  
But Simon was looking at her with stars in her eyes and she realised that was the first time she’d used her new Name.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> For Carmarthen, who listed these two fandoms next to each other…


	13. No Losers

“And then… what?”   
“And then you say ‘thank you’ and walk away,” Kareen said, smiling.  
“But… that doesn’t make any SENSE. How do you know how the Deal has worked if neither of you is there to see the other’s reaction?”  
“That IS the deal, love. You give the person something you think THEY will like, and they give you something they think YOU will like. Whoever makes the other person happiest, wins. It’s a no-lose situation.”  
“I’ll tell you this,” Mark said “Father Frost has never been to Jackson’s Hole!”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> For Cordialcount, who said “that neat concept that jumps out at you from something specific in canon”


	14. Cats

“Miles.”  
“Milady?”  
“Miles,” Ekaterin continued firmly, because if you let Miles distract you with sweet talk, foot rubs, flowers or Ma Costi snacks you NEVER managed to get to whatever you wanted to talk sternly to him about, “it’s time. I’ve made an appointment for Thursday, and I’m hoping you are going to help me with the armsmen.”  
“The armsmen will do whatever you ask them to do,” he said, quick as a flash, and she suppressed a grin at his immediate Reversion To Military and how easily shocked he was at the thought of an improper chain of command. The Vorkosigan Pecking order was, clearly, Miles, Cordelia, Ekaterin, Mark, Kareen, Aral Alexander, Helen Natalia and Nikki, and woe betide any armsman who didn’t answer any of the female members of that chain of command with a firm “ma’am, yes ma’am” when given a request. Well, except Helen Natalia for another couple of years, hopefully.  
“Don’t evade,” she said firmly. “We are up to our knees in cats. Strange Vor pass by on the other side of the street in case you come and auditorially inform them they’re going to home a kitten. Zap is Going To The Vet. As are ALL of the other cats. And you are not, lovie, going to disappear on auditorial duties when it’s time to round them up and put them in travelling crates.”  
“You know…” Miles mused, “it might be easier just to get the vet to… come here?”   
“And ask Ma Costi to give up her kitchen table for an operating table?”  
Miles went pale. “I’ll make sure we have enough carrying cases.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> For Firefly124, who said “Vorkosigan” and “cats” in the same post


	15. Planning ahead

Really, it wasn’t so unusual. That boy on Captain Negri’s staff might be a little… odd, but that was mainly on account of the chip in his head, and whatever had the Emperor been thinking about when he decided to make him have THAT? But a few glances, a carelessly fallen glove, a little press of the hand on its return, and he was hers, entirely, as entirely as that fool Padma.  
The baby was coming along nicely now, the first and most important card in her hand. Apart from the five year old Gregor, little baby Ivan when he emerged would be the undisputed heir. Ezar had managed Serg very nicely, but he hadn’t been able to manage his own death bed. It would be within the year, and - while she might otherwise never have given it a moment’s consideration - it was obvious that Kareen wouldn’t be able to hold things together without help.  
But Negri was hers, and Illyan was hers, and Baby Ivan was hers, and little Gregor called her Tante Alys and in his own way he was as much hers as that fool Kareen’s. Vordarian, honestly! As if anyone with an ounce of wit couldn’t see that Vordarian wasn’t the man to manage the Empire through a Regency that might last fifteen years or, conceivably, should anything happen to Gregor that led to him being replaced with Ivan, even twenty years.  
So there we have it, Alys thought sadly. It was just too important, both to the Empire and to the Emperor, that Aral Vorkosigan should marry… suitably. He could hardly be permitted to marry some offworlder plebe on the run from her mental health professional and her security service alike, not to mention her dubious history on the wrong side of the Escobar adventure. No, Alys told herself as she pressed the switch that activated Illyan’s device and sent the shuttle painlessly into separate molecules raining down on the Barrayaran night like Winterfair frost, Aral and she would make a superb couple. All she had to do now was think of a suitable way of… providing, for poor Padma.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> For Avanti_90, who asked for Aral/Alys or Aral/Kareen, and made my brain hurt (I thought about the OTHER Kareen…) and come up with evil!Alys


End file.
